AFTER THE AMALGAM CRISIS
by MiddleAgedMutantNinjaTurtle
Summary: After the Amalgam Crisis, the Multiverse has been restored to its normal levels of chaos and order. Changes have been made...


DC/MARVEL COMICS FAN FICTION

DC AND MARVEL COMICS BELONG TO SOMEONE ELSE. I MERELY BORROW THEM FOR FUN

DC/MARVEL COMICS AFTER THE GREAT AMALGAMATION CRISIS

A Day In The Life…

8 A.M.

THE AVENGERS

Ben Grimm watched the rocket launch with Tony Stark.

"I dunno Tone," he said, "I feel funny not flyin' that thing."

"Don't worry about it," Stark told him, "I have a little something for you to fly."

"What?"

"Battle armor. An improvement on mine. If it isn't a bust, I'll sell it to the Pentagon."

"Whatzit do?" Grimm sat in the limo next to Stark. The driver put his foot down and they roared off in the direction of New York City.

"It does what the Iron Man armor does", Stark said, "but it repairs itself and heals your wounds too. Nano-tech. It's the ultimate scrounger, like Radar on the M.A.S.H. tv sitcom."

"Huh."

Stark laughed at Grimm's skepticism.

"It won't get confused. Trust me."

"That what you said to Banner and Cage? Trust me?"

"Yeah," Stark sighed, "but you have to admit Cage came out okay. "

"He went through Hell in hip waders!" Grimm growled, "Jennifer Banner is the She-Hulk. Bruce ain't sure he wants to spend yer dead presidents!"

"He is, though. He's the top researcher at Stark Solutions."

"Awright…what's this armor called?"

"Death Machine."

"I know some people on Yancy Street'd love that…"

Stark chuckled.

10 A.M.

Tony Stark stared at the disaster on the examination table. He'd promised Grimm and failed his friend. The damned Death Machine armor DID get confused, but it had reason to be. The Danger Room sim was too good, it damaged armor and man together so badly the nano-tech consumed some of the bio-matter itconsidered unsalvageable to repair shredded armor. Half of Ben Grimm was a machine.

He was automatically an Avenger. Stark wanted to keep him close, so he didn't have to work too hard to track him down when he figured out how to reverse the changes inflicted on him.

Grimm's biological eye opened and stared up at him.

12P.M.

THE FANTASTIC FOUR

The hypervelocity rocket slammed into The Blue Area of The Moon. The four people inside survived inside their adamantium space armor, but not much else did. Victor von Doom groaned and staggered upright. His wife, Susan Storm Doom, was unconscious. He dragged her and Johnny Storm out of the wreckage. Reed Richards, already awake, stood outside the rocket's remains, looking confused and fascinated. Doom understood how he felt.

They were deep inside The Blue Area of The Moon, in a cavern full of very high tech machinery and glowing forms that changed shape and made weird noises.

"I don't feel good," Richards coughed.

His face looked orange through the transparent faceplate of the space armor. Doom checked his sensors. They did not recognize the energy present, but his mage senses did. There was great power all around.

"By the Vishanti," he muttered, "can I do it?"

"What?" Richards said.

"Nothing, Reed—sit over there." Doom pointed at a throne-like boulder shimmering with orange light. There was an orange flash of light when Richards sat on it. He fell over. His space armor shattered.

Doom took his helmet off. The air smelled of ozone, electricity, and power—all things he liked. He dragged Johnny and Sue over to a machine that appeared to be burning, melting, and reforming. He touched it and channeled the energies blasting out of it.

This time the flash of light was brighter. The flames disappeared. The machine froze in one state. An impossibly thin, tall, pale-skinned bald man in a white robe materialized in the cavern.

"You are a fool, Victor von Doom," he said, "but you mean well. I will send you home with what you took because of that…"

He stood on the top floor of Doom Tower, looking out over New York City's Central Park. Richards groaned again. Doom smiled. Big, scaly, orange, super strong, super tough—his brain was neither damaged nor improved. He still loved Sue Storm, and would work for Victor von Doom to be close to her. So be it. He would pay every day of his life as the big orange Thing for the rocket malfunction.

Sue and Johnny looked themselves. His mage sense said different. They were different and powerful. Their eyes opened. It was time to teach them about their new power. They knew him well enough to know he could be trusted. Trusted to do what was best for him…and them. Richards? Well, that might be a different story.

2P.M.

Ben "Death Machine" Grimm slapped Loki into the path of Thor's hammer and Stark's repulsor blasts. It was more-or-less a tie, as far as Grimm could tell, which of the two hurt most. Thor grabbed his stunned half-brother and began spinning Mjolnir in the air above them. A vortex of energies neither battle armors' sensors made much sense of erupted overhead.

"The All-Father will not be pleased," Thor rumbled. He leaped up into the vortex, which collapsed with a blinding flash of light.

"Does he really believe he's a god?" Viper asked, hips arrogantly, sexily cocked as she looked at the rubble-strewn street.

"My sensors make a damned good lie detector," Stark said, "he believes it."

"Huh."

"To-neee…" Grimm struggled to speak.

"Yes, Ben?"

"P…p…promised…"

"Yes I did," Stark said, "you will be your old self again some day."

"Trust…you…"

Natasha "Black Widow" Romanoff turned away. "Dead man walking," Viper muttered, smirking.

"Hey!" Jennifer "She-Hulk" Banner loomed over the lithe woman dressed in a green second-skin body-suit, "what's your problem? The man's hurting. I just wanna hug him…"

Viper snorted. "Go ahead!"

The Avengers' jet landed, VTOL-style. They boarded and left the scene to New York's finest. Stark found himself admiring Jennifer Banner's green muscled body…and wondering if she and Viper would get mad at each other for wearing the same color.

THE SAME DAY

THE SILVER SURFER

The Dyson Sphere-worldship GALACTUS was eating the worlds of his home solar system, preparing to take the system sun too, as Norrin Radd shattered the stone sheltering the Jewel of Cyttorak. Radd stared down at the Terrans who'd nearly taken it first. One of them, still alive, opened his eyes.

WHY?

"You are strong for a Terran."

YOU DID NOT ANSWER MY QUESTION.

"I never will."

Norrin Radd picked up the Jewel of Cyttorak and slapped it against his skull. There was no pain. _He was pain. Pain passed from him. Norrin Radd faded into the past. The Silver Surfer was the future. Vengeance was his life. The GALACTUS must be destroyed, the Galacti must pay. He would see to it…_

THE GALACTUS

"The matter of this system has increased the Galactus' size," the Senior Galacti said to the Galactic Council, "but the star is the important thing. What is left of the previous fuel source is stored in Container 13."

No one was in any doubt that they would achieve the goal of continued existence as they understood it. Nothing could stop them. The galaxy and the universe provided many places to exploit for the GALACTUS to grow, for the Galacti to thrive. Surviving the death of a universe made survivalism the only philosophy worth knowing and mastering and following.

BOOM! DOOM-DOOM-DOOM! WHAM!

"What is it?"

THE SOLE SURVIVOR OF THE SYSTEM JUST CONSUMED, the GALACTUS A.I. said, IT HAS CONSUMED A POWER SOURCE WITH NEAR-INFINITE POTENTIAL, BUT IT IS BOUND TO IT. WE MIGHT ONE DAY ACQUIRE IT FOR OUR OWN USE, BUT IT WILL REQUIRE THE DEATH OF THE CURRENT OWNER…

"Kill it if you can," the Senior Galacti said, "but I grow weary of lesser beings trying to stop us. Kill it or let us go to hyperspace and leave it behind."

A hatch the size of a planet opened in millions of square miles of adamantium hull. A jet of plasma hundreds of miles dense blasted the Silver Surfer deeper into deep space. The GALACTUS was gone when the Surfer woke.

YOU NEED HELP.

"You survived death Xavier?"

INDEED. I AM PART OF YOU NOW.

"I will find help," Norrin Radd said, "it is a big galaxy, a big universe. There are many who would beg to be allowed to strike at the GALACTUS."

WHAT IS YOUR PLAN?

"Why should I tell you?"

The Silver Surfer left the area, leaping into hyperspace for a short journey. He exited in the middle of a space battle between a fleet of small vessels and a single, much larger, cube-shaped starship. The larger ship cruised, mostly ignoring the fleet, but when it fired its weapons many small vessels shattered and fell behind.

Ignoring the fleet too the Surfer phased through the hull of the huge cube.

"I greet you Thanos of Titan," he said to a tall, heavily muscled purple-skinned humanoid, "I have a proposal for you."

"You want to destroy the GALACTUS," Thanos said, "you could not until you became power. "

"I still cannot," Radd said, "you worship Death. Killing the Galacti would be a great act of worship, eh? I am not limiting my search for aid only to you, Thanos. I will contact you when the time is come."

"Do that," Thanos said, "I will be ready when you are."

The Surfer phased out of the hull of Thanos' ship. There were many fewer ships shooting at it. He destroyed them with a wave of an arm and a storm of energy blasts. An hour or two later he was flying over Earth again, zipping through the concrete canyons of New York City. A teleport brought an ordinary looking short Terran to his board, and Radd raced back into space.

"You are the Molecule Man."

"Why have you kidnapped me?" the Molecule Man asked, shocked at the power he sensed in the being on the board. He couldn't do anything to it or the silver man.

"I need your help. I also need you to understand your power better than you do now. Touch the jewel on my head."

The Molecule Man did so, gasped, and sat on the board, staring at nothing.

"I…I…I didn't know."

"Knowledge is power. Knowing how to use what you know is greater power. "

"I…I will help you."

"You gained knowledge of what I must do from the jewel?"

"Yes."

The Molecule Man's body shimmered, and was covered with a space-black coat of second-skin something.

"I like this!"

"Good."

A moment later there was a silver man on a silver board, and a space-black man on a space-black board, flying together.

TO BE CONTINUED…


End file.
